§ 79 and 80. Dame Patricia Hornsby-Smithasked the Secretary of State for Social Services (1) if he will take steps to check multiple registration by drug addicts with different general practitioners in different National Health Service Executive Committee areas; and if he will take steps to require addicts to present a registration card on which prescriptions for certain classified drugs are entered so that doctors are aware of the quantities issued to any patient over any period;
(2) what is the time-lag between registration with a general practitioner, notification to the National Health Service Executive Committee, and that committee's ability to establish that a patient is registered, and has not cancelled such registration, with one or more other general practitioners.
§ Sir K. JosephThe existing procedures are designed to prevent multiple registrations. The time taken to cancel a registration where necessary largely depends on the speed with which doctors notify Executive Councils of new registrations and the accuracy of the particulars enabling patients to be identified in the records.
I would not expect serious difficulties to arise in relation to notified addicts. The number of drugs upon which people may become dependent is such that any 311W requirement that patients should produce a record of prescriptions would have to be of general application, and I am not satisfied that this is necessary or practicable.